The Pickle Picker

An awesome business co-founder is:

• A great producer of work-product – skilled at excel for financial models, powerpoint or keynote for pitch decks, writing for web copy, email updates. By great I don’t mean a resume that says “capable” at those software programs – I mean someone that knows how to create a financial model, builds beautiful decks, and writes really well.  You should be impressed when you see their stuff.
• A hustler – someone who likes talking to people, has done cold calling in sales at some point, has a knack for getting meetings, loves going to networking events.
• A leader - has taken a leadership role in their community, organizes events, has a blog, has an opinion, speaks at conferences and events – someone who puts themselves out there.
• A doer - takes stuff and runs with it.  Sometimes termed a self-starter, I prefer “a doer” because they are going to get it done, whatever it takes. This may mean delegating, outsourcing, or hiring, but it means the job will get done.  You need to be focused on product development, you want a co-founder who makes your life easier by doing stuff, not talking about it.

A bad business co-founder is:

• A fake co-founder - someone not up to the challenge that you are plugging in just to fill the role b/c you think you’re supposed to have a co-founder
• An idea guy or gal - someone who thinks they have brilliant ideas that someone else should implement
• A talker – the opposite of a doer, a talker just talks about stuff that should get done, but never seems to be pulling their own weight
• A big leaguer – someone who has had a successful career as an executive so they think the daily grind of getting stuff done is below them

Of all of those, the one I look for is the producer of work product.  It’s so important to be able to produce high-quality output.  Just like writing code, a business co-founder should be capable of producing business stuff.  What do you look for in a business co-founder?

While its fresh, I want to share some thoughts on why some companies did or didn’t get in, so you can be better prepared to apply next year or to another accelerator.

You need:

• Shovel-ready product development - even if you don’t have product yet, we need to have confidence you’re ready to hit the ground running.  If you’re not building or ready to build, you’re not ready.
• Hustle and drive - the best way to communicate how good you are is to show that you are building this company anyway, with or without Ignition.  We had a founder who went from talking about his idea at our info session in December to having a prototype built before he finished interviewing. It was clear he was building this company with or without us, and this communicated a lot about his drive.

Deal breakers:

• All founders not able to attend the whole program - last year we flexed on this a bit and learned why its so important for all founders to attend the entire program.  If you we’re able to commit to being in New Orleans for the whole program, we didn’t let you in.  The value of an accelerator is in being part of it, and if only one founder attends, it leads to companies not being calibrated.
• Uncommitted founders – founders who still are working full-time or have a second company were a deal-breaker.  You may be able to bootstrap a company or self-fund it this way, but its not an appropriate structure for an accelerator or attractive to investors.  You may see it as a safety net, but we need you all-in.
• Unable to communicate vision – several companies left us scratching our heads as to what they did or wanted to do, even after multiple interviews. You need to be able to communicate your vision succinctly.  Practice this with regular people. If they don’t understand it, simplify and refine.
• Kitchen sink approach – take your core value proposition and then layer on everything else you might possibly build. Not a good approach.  Refine your core value to its core functionality. You can build up later. But you must have something core that makes people want to use your product.

We’re excited to be announcing our class Feb 13.  Hopefully this feedback is helpful to applicants who didn’t get in and to those who will be applying next year.

Thank you so much for participating in TribeCon 2011. It was a huge success and we were thrilled to have you as a part of it. TribeCon is something that has been very special to me, as you know this year was my last as the producer, and I look forward to seeing things evolve as the community takes things forward.

Katy produced an impact report in your own words… er, tweets… take a look. It’s a great recount of our experience together and the impact of the event:
Impact Report: http://scr.bi/s7XwOB
Pictures from Taylor Davidson: http://on.fb.me/sw245S
Speaker Slides: http://slidesha.re/bKOcdm
If TribeCon is important to you and your community, send me a quick email to share why, so next year’s “Big Chief” can make TribeCon 2012 the best yet. I’ve had a number of people reach out about taking a leadership role in TribeCon next year, if you’re interested in being part of that conversation, please email me.

Thanks so much to our speakers, sponsors, and volunteer team who made TribeCon possible. It’s been an incredible run and now it’s time for this Big Chief to sign off, thank you for making TribeCon such a special experience for all of us.

- Chris Schultz & the Tribe

Free pizza from Reginelli’s will be provided by Fleur de Lis Financial.

Click here to RSVP

Tuesday, July 12 at 6:30 PM in the IP Boardroom

Please read the invite below from Andrew Yang of  Venture for America

RSVP to: eileen@ventureforamerica.org

Hello -

With your help, we want to send 10+ of the top college graduates from around the country to New Orleans to work for your companies.

Venture for America (VFA), a new national non-profit, will begin recruiting at top colleges around the country this fall for its inaugural class of 2012 Venture Fellows. VFA (patterned after Teach for America) will be offering a competitive fellowship program for top college graduates to work in select start-ups or early-stage companies for 2 years.  At the same time, the organization aspires to spur enterprise and encourage entrepreneurship in parts of the U.S. that struggle to attract top college graduates.  The goal of Venture for America is to create 100,000 U.S. jobs by 2025 and train hundreds of future founders and CEOs.

You can find out more about the organization at www.ventureforamerica.org.

Our goal is to place at least 10 Fellows at entrepreneurial companies in the New Orleans area starting in the Summer of 2012. To that end we’ll be hosting a Start-up Summit on Tuesday, July 12th at 6:30PM  at Launch Pad in the IP Boardroom. Light fare will be provided by Capdeville Restaurant and everyone is invited next door to Capdeville for drinks after the event.

We are expecting a good turnout and hope you will plan to be part of it!

Please RSVP to Eileen Lee (eileen@ventureforamerica.org), and let us know if we can provide any other information that might be helpful.

Congratulations on the great work that you’re doing – we’re eager to send young people to both support and learn from you.

All of the best, – Andrew

Venture for America

Jazz Fest is here and Launch Fest is right around the corner. We hope you’re as excited as we are. Please save this email, its got everything you need to know!

THE DEETS

When: Wednesday, May 4 & Thursday, May 5 – 2-5pm – Registration opens at 1pm
Where: New Orleans Museum of Art, One Collins C. Diboll Circle, City Park New Orleans, Louisiana 70124 (Map)

We’ve got a great lineup of speakers.
Brad Feld – Foundry Group
Scott Case – Startup America
Stephen DiMarco – Compete.com
Anne Driscoll – Ning
Bob Dorf – Customer Development
Sean Greene – SBA
Leah Culver – Convore
Brent McCrossen – Audiosocket
Wednesday, May 4 – Entrepreneur Day – Programming targeted towards startups
1pm – 2pm – Conference registration at NOMA
2pm – 5pm – Sessions
7pm – Speaker + Investor + Mentor + Founder dinner (invitation only)
Thursday, May 5 – Investor Day – Demo Day – Ignition company pitches & investor sessions
Noon – 1:30pm – Investor roundtable luncheon in NOMA boardroom (invitation only)
2:00pm – 3:15pm – Startup America panel & Brad Feld
3:30pm – 4:30pm – Ignition demo day pitches – if you can just make one thing, you don’t want to miss this!
4:30pm – 6:30pm – Investor + Founder reception
THE LAGNIAPPE

A few tasty extras to fill ya up on Launch Fest.

Dress is casual
We want you to be comfortable and ready to enjoy all New Orleans has to offer while you’re here

Transportation to NOMA/Launch Fest/Jazz Fest
There is a shuttle bus making continuous trips from the French Quarter/Downtown to the Fairgrounds each day. You can purchase tickets and learn more here.
NOMA is a 15 minute cab from downtown hotels.

Parking Info
Parking is available around NOMA in City Park. On Thursday Jazz Fest will be going on, so plan a few extra minutes to find a parking spot. Parking will be available by the tennis courts.

Admission to Launch Fest May 4-5th
Paying for admission to the New Orleans Museum of Art is NOT required, just mention you are here for Launch Fest. If you have not registered, please do so now, but don’t worry about bringing tickets, we’ll have your name on the list for check in.

Attending Jazz Fest May 4-8th
Purchase your ticket online or at the gate For more information and full line up click here

Attending Barre Fest May 5-6th
If you’ve read this far, we’ve got a treat for you. Our very own Barre Tanguis is hosting his own fest Friday & Saturday alongside the action at Jazz Fest. Stop by Barre Fest before or after your day at Jazz Fest, walk ups welcome and encouraged. We’ll be socializing during the day and partying at night Friday and Saturday. Cold beer, bbq, live music and Barre! What more could you want?
1459 Verna Court (map)

Happy Launch Fest! See you Wednesday.

- Katy, Barre, Peter, Chris, & Will

Click here and RSVP now!

This is the culmination of several years of planning and preparation, and we are particularly excited to be launching as a part of the TechStars Network, and by extension the Obama administration’s new Startup America Initiative.

Ignition has been a personal passion project. The conversation started a year ago, after I wrote my open letter to David Cohen (see, they really work).  Andrew Hyde has been a huge supporter and Taylor Davidson has been instrumental in helping us model this out and make it happen. Thank you to the fantastic mentors who have already committed to being onboard.  If you’re interested, please contact me. I’m excited to be working with my co-founders of Barre Tanguis, Will Donaldson, Peter Bodenheimer and Mark Graffagnini, this really is like a startup itself.

An exciting leap for the New Orleans startup ecosystem, Ignition creates a framework to help founders refine their product offering, invigorate their business plans, and raise funding to fuel their growth.  So, if you are a startup in New Orleans, or willing to move to New Orleans to accelerate the growth of your company, definitely check out the info and get your application in before March 18.

Learn more about Launch Pad Ignition, the TechStars Network, and Startup America.  See more detailed information in our press release. We are proud to be playing a role in accelerating entrepreneurship.  Startups, start your engines!

• format – we are going to hold you to 5 min, so be sure to keep your pitch tight and focused.  this is plenty of time if you are rehearsed and gives you an opportunity to communicate about your company or project in a way that will keep the audiences attention and hopefully spark conversation with you afterwards.
• goal – what do you want to accomplish?  start there, think about that deeply.  are you trying to raise funding, attract users/customers, generate press? utilize this forum to accomplish something for your business. focus on achieving that goal and don’t worry if your pitch isn’t broad enough to be interesting to everyone.  that’s why we’re keeping them to 5 min. this is not an exercise, this is an opportunity to accomplish something for your business.
• ask – close (and maybe open too) with your ask.  be specific and be clear.  ie: 1) we’re looking to find new school customers, so if you know anyone in education, please refer me to them. 2) we’re currently raising a seed round of $500k and have $200k committed.  3) we are looking to generate awareness about our platform so please follow us @yourname and tweet about us 4) we’re looking for beta users to please sign up on www.yourwebsitename.com for an invite.
• practice – please, please, please give your pitch out loud, standing up.  if you don’t you will run too long.  You will have 100x improvement in your pitch by giving it several times, getting feedback, doing more of whats working, less of whats not.  ask for candid feedback.  treat this as the real-deal, not a practice.  you want to be proud of your pitch.
• show, don’t tell – if you have a product, show it, demo it if you can do it very quickly.  1-2 min videos are great, b/c you can prepare them in advance and they can be extremely professional. live demos are difficult to do, if you are going to do it, please have someone else to “drive”.  screenshots of your product are actually much better than a live demo.  remember, the audience doesn’t know your product nearly as well as you do, so showcase the “wow” factor, but don’t expect them to understand it and don’t try to do a deep dive about how it works.  focus on the sexy and sizzle.
• elevator pitch arc – there are lots of blog posts about what people want to hear in an elevator pitch.  this obviously varies depending on what your goal is.  but have a clear outlined format, don’t just talk. you’ll be judged by the audience as much on your professionalism and clarity in approach as you will on your product.  remember to touch on things like: problem, solution, market, team, traction, business model.
• deck –  i’d recommend keeping it to 5-8 slides, unless you are able to run your preso very tightly and succinctly.  don’t read whats on the slide, use the slide for backup and then give context, explanation or tell a story.  make sure that what you are saying connects with the slides but you are not reading bullet points, nothing is more dull.
• get excited! relax and have fun – the coaching advice here is to help you be prepared and confident. practicing beforehand will give you confidence and help you relax. make sure your excitement about your company comes through, excitement is contagious. this is a friendly audience, everyone is rooting for you. you will be great.

Here are some resources that I like:

• http://www.slideshare.net/UTR/how-to-pitch-a-vc-dave-mcclure
• http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2005/12/the_102030_rule.html#axzz1ASoQA9sv
• http://www.socialedge.org/discussions/funding/the-social-entrepreneur-s-pitch/
• http://venturebeat.com/2010/05/24/five-minute-pitch-sliderocket/
• http://ryanacademy.wordpress.com/2010/08/08/techstars-show-how-to-pitch-with-passion-prt-1/
• http://www.quora.com/Elevator-Pitch-Descriptions?q=pitch